Howells-Dodge spanks GACC

The Howells-Dodge Football Team blasted GACC 40-6 on the road Friday night in action heard on 107.9 the Bull.

Here is the scoring summary from the game:

First Quarter
HD - Luke Rocheford Kickoff Return TD 67 yards (Trevor Jedlicka run for two-point conversion)
HD - RJ Bayer 6 Yd Pass From Darrin Pokorny (RJ Bayer catch For Two-Point Conversion)

Second Quarter
GACC - Cody Steffen 1 Yd Run (Failed Two-Point Conversion)
HD - Luke Rocheford 63 Yd Kickoff Return (Failed Two-Point Conversion)
HD - Darrin Pokorny 12 Yd Run (Failed Two-Point Conversion)

Third Quarter
HD - Luke Rocheford 5 Yd Run (Failed Two-Point Conversion)

Fourth Quarter
HD - Luke Rocheford 25 Yd Pass From Darrin Pokorny (Failed Two-Point Conversion)

Pokorny was 4-9 passing for 85 yards with a two touchdowns, and also rushed for 73 yards on 8 carries, and scored a TD.

Head Coach Mike Speirs says Pokorny has shined for the Jaguars so far this season. "Darrin has done an outstanding job thru the first two games. He is a true dual threat QB. Darrin is in 2nd year as a starting QB and he has a great grasp of our offense. Darrin's ability to run the ball really comes into play when we call a pass play. He has to ability to get positive yardage when he scrambles and that makes it a little more difficult for a defense to drop a lot of people into coverage."

Rocheford hauled in 2 passes for 56 yards, including a touchdown.

Levi Belina had 17 tackles while Pokorny had 16. R.J. Bayer notched 15 while Carter Throener and Trevor Schumacher had 14 and 13, respectively. Aandy Dominguez had 8 while Charlie Dvorak made 7.

Speirs says his team was very sound defensively. "We had very few missed tackles or assignments vs GACC. Our kids did a great job of understanding their assignments and then executing that assignment. That allowed us to get a lot of players to the ball on each play."

The Jaguars amassed 248 yards of total offense, including 163 rushing.

Speirs says defense and special teams was the name of the game. "Our special teams and defense set us up with some early scores and allowed us to play with a lead. Any time you can return 2 kickoffs for scores it will be big for your team. I thought our defense did an outstanding job on Friday night."

Howells-Dodge (2-0) hosts Wakefield (1-0) Friday night.

The Trojans upset then No. 1 Creighton 28-22 at home last Friday night.

Speirs says his team has their work cut out for them. "Wakefield is an outstanding team coming off of a huge win against the #1 team in state. They have good size up front and very quick, talented skill players. We will have our hands full this week. If we rest on last weeks game, next Friday will be a long night. It will be another case of making sure our kids understand their assignments and are prepared to execute at a high level."

I feel the Jaguars have a good chance to win given how well they played against the Bluejays last week.

Speirs says he's pleased with his team's start, but knows they still have work to do. "Any time you can start the season 2-0 you have to be pleased as a coach. We know we have some deficiencies that have been exposed in the first 2 games and are working in practice to fix those. Overall we are happy to be 2-0, but understand that we have some very tough games left on the schedule and must improve each week to stay competitive."

I think as well as Howells-Dodge played last week they're going to need to play even better this week to pick up another win.

It should be a great game, and I'm excited to find out how it goes and unfolds.

These next two games are the toughest of the season for the Jaguars without a doubt as Howells-Dodge is at Lutheran High Northeast in two weeks.

The Jaguars have to be mighty confident heading into these games though given what they did to two very good teams in Weeks 1 and 2.

Howells-Dodge has to raise their level of play once again this week, and not be hungover from the Central Catholic win.

The win over the Bluejays was nice and great, but now it is time to move on and get ready for Wakefield.

The Trojans are a great team and no joke so the Jaguars have to come ready to ball out once again in order to win.